The Most Beautiful Thing
Obviously you can see the picture (which is totally stolen from the intarwebs). First, let me admit that green is my favorite color. I would surround myself with jade if I were ever given the wherewithal to do so. In further point of fact, the most beautiful sculpture I have ever seen is in the National Palace Museum in Taibei. It is a bok choy carved from a single piece of jade. The leaves are green and the stems are white. It is beyond exquisite and the artist made full use of the color variation in that single piece of stone to make an object of passing beauty.
But I digress from the pupa of the Monarch butterfly. I find the colors of green that flow through that object to be the most beautiful thing in nature. The dots of gold, the line of gold shadowed by black. Even the shape is gorgeous, lushly round yet creased with an edge that gives the roundness its counterpoint, that redefines the curves. I may have to revisit this description as I don't seem to be able to do this small glory justice this night.
There's more yet. If I were female I would have enamel earrings made to look exactly like a pair of these cocoons. And as I wore them, I would dream of having a pair of jade earrings instead, chased with pure gold, touched with black coral. But I'm not a woman. So I'm left with the question of how a man acquires an object like this. To wear in some way. Don't even suggest a tattoo, I've already thought of that. It doesn't work. Unless I move to San Francisco and am sure to wear some flowers in my hair.